There was always
an undercurrent of disquiet when the Lockerbie trial ended in Holland earlier
this year. The unanimous guilty verdict on Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed Al Megrahi
unexpected, the not guilty verdict on Al Amin Khalifa Fhimah apparently
inconsistent, the loose logic adopted in the written judgement seemingly open to
challenge.

Yet criticism was
largely muted, even among some relatives of the 270 victims of Pan Am Flight 103
who had fought so hard and for so long to have the case brought to court and
were mostly convinced that if the Libyans were involved at all they were, at
best, minor players in a greater conspiracy that would only be exposed with the
trial over.

Once the shock of
the court's findings had sunk in, a consensus quickly arose among those with
reservations about the verdicts. After all, due process of law had been followed
and evidence had been heard in open court as promised. This had the effect of
more or less suppressing the widespread sense of dissatisfaction.

Into this
comparative vacuum stepped the Lord Advocate, Colin Boyd, with a series of
"roadshows" for relatives in Britain and America which were said to
have a distinctly triumphalist tone. The reputation of Robert Black, the
Edinburgh University law professor who had been a constant critic of the way the
case was handled, was subjected to "vicious and acidic" attack,
according to one relative present at the briefings. It was also suggested that
had Megrahi given evidence Fhimah would have been convicted too.

Trial judge Lord
Sutherland agreed that such personal briefings were unusual but added in
reference to Black who was adamant there was insufficient evidence for a guilty
verdict: "If the Crown were getting their own back I'm not entirely
surprised ... I suppose pointing out that he wasn't necessarily right might be a
useful counterblast."

Now the
authorities are facing a different kind of counterblast, this time from an
independent observer who cannot be easily ignored. Dr Hans Koechler, president
of the Vienna-based International Progress Organisation and a world -renowned
expert on law and human rights, was personally appointed by United Nations
Secretary General Kofi Annan to ensure fair play and high standards. Koechler,
who sat through every day of the trial at Camp Zeist, not only supports Black's
argument that there was insufficient evidence to convict Megrahi, but goes much
further in condemning what went on in the special court as hopelessly
contaminated by political considerations to the detriment of the rule of law.
The conduct of the judges, previously regarded as beyond reproach, is also
criticised for allowing a political dimension to be present in the courtroom and
therefore to influence the final outcome.

This is a
monumental embarrassment to the judges, the Crown prosecution team, and to the
UN, an organisation that was pivotal in brokering the diplomatic understanding
that allowed the Lockerbie trial to go ahead in a neutral venue after so many
years of the British and American governments refusing to compromise.

On the day,
January 31, Fhimah was set free and Megrahi was sentenced to life imprisonment,
Annan said: "Justice has taken its course and the authority and legitimacy
of the legal process must be respected. "

Within days ,
Annan had received a report from Koechler telling him exactly what he didn't
want to hear; the trial had been tainted by political interference and the
verdicts were contradictory and irrational.

Yesterday a
spokesman for Annan attempted to distance the UN from Koechler's report, saying
it amounted to one person's personal opinion and could not be regarded as an
official UN document. And the Crown Office pointed out that Koechler seemed not
to understand the adversarial nature of criminal procedures in Scots law, nor
how it was for the prosecution and defence to decide what evidence was presented
in court, not the judges.

Koechler's report,
does not pull any punches in its forthright condemnation of the way politics was
allowed to dictate the course of the Lockerbie trial.

The problems began
on the first day with two representatives of the US Justice Department sitting
with the Crown prosecution team and seemingly acting as "supervisors"
of strategy and presentation of evidence.

Soon after the
start of the trial in May last year, Scotland on Sunday revealed concern over
the presence of American lawyers Dana Biehl and Brian Murtaugh, members of the
Office for the Victims of Crime, an offshoot of the Department of Justice. It
was said their presence gave the court "an unfortunate US v Libya flavour".

Koechler writes:
"This serious problem of due process became evident in the matter of the
CIA cables concerning one of the Crown's key witnesses, Mr Giaka. Those cables
were initially dismissed by the prosecution as not relevant but proved to be
highly relevant when finally (but only partially) released."

The cables
eventually showed that Abdul Majid Giaka, a Libyan defector, had been paid by
the CIA for information which was regarded as of minimal worth. He had not
mentioned any knowledge of Lockerbie until months after the bombing and only
after being threatened with having his payments stopped. Then he implicated the
accused by claiming to have seen them at Luqa airport in Malta with a suspicious
suitcase.

"It has
become obvious that the presence of foreign governments in a Scottish courtroom
(in any courtroom for that matter) jeopardises the independence and integrity of
legal procedures and is not in conformity with the general standards of
fairness," Koechler wrote.

Relatives of the
victims also complained about the two, sometimes three, Americans who sat with
the prosecution team. In response, the Lord Advocate, Colin Boyd, said it was up
to him who was invited to join him in the court.

Koechler's
criticism extended to the defence, and the presence of Kamal Maghour, a former
foreign affairs minister in the Libyan government . Again, Maghour was not
listed in any official records as being present. The two Libyan accused lodged a
special defence blaming named Palestinian terrorists for the bombing.

"It was a
consistent pattern during the whole trial that - as an apparent result of
political interests and considerations - efforts were undertaken to withhold
substantial information from the court. It may never be fully known to which
extent relevant information was hidden from the court. The most serious case...
is related to the special defence. The alternative theory of the defence -
leading to conclusions contradictory to those of the prosecution - was never
seriously investigated... although it was officially declared as being of major
importance to the defence. By not having pursued... an alternative theory, the
court seems to have accepted that the whole legal process was seriously flawed
in regard to the requirements of objectivity and due process. As a result the
undersigned (Koechler) has reached the conclusion that foreign governments or
governmental agencies may have been allowed, albeit indirectly, to determine to
a considerable extent, which evidence was made available to the court."

Koechler says it
was "highly arbitrary and irrational" to take witnesses like Giaka and
Edwin Bollier, whose electronics firm supplied the fatal timing device, and rely
on parts of their evidence when other parts were dismissed as riddled with
inconsistencies and contradictions.

"In spite of
the reservations explaining the verdict itself, the guilty verdict in the case
of Megrahi is particularly incomprehensible in view of the admission by the
judges themselves that identification was 'not absolute' and that there was a
mass of conflicting evidence," the report says. Furthermore, the Opinion of
the Court seems to be inconsistent in a basic respect: while the first accused
was found guilty, the second accused was found not guilty. This is totally
incomprehensible when one considers that the indictment in its very essence was
based on the joint action of the two accused in Malta."

Koechler asserts,
"The guilty verdict in regard to the first accused appears to be arbitrary,
even irrational. This leads the undersigned to the suspicion that political
considerations may have been over-riding a strictly judicial evaluation of the
case thus may have adversely affected the outcome of the trial. This may have a
profound impact on the evaluation of the professional reputation and integrity
of the panel of three Scottish judges. Seen from the final outcome, a certain
co-ordination of the strategies of prosecution, of defence, and of the judges'
considerations during the later period of the trial is not totally unlikely.
This, however, when actually proven, would have a devastating effect on the
whole legal process of the Scottish Court in the Netherlands and on the legal
quality of its findings.

"In the above
context, the undersigned has reached the general conclusion that the outcome of
the trial may well have been determined by political considerations and may to a
considerable extent have been the result of more or less openly exercised
influence from the part of actors outside the judicial framework - facts which
are not compatible with the basic principle of the division of powers and with
the independence of the judiciary, and which put in jeopardy the very rule of
law and the confidence citizens must have in the legitimacy of state power and
the functioning of the state's organs - whether on the traditional national
level or in the framework of international justice."

Koechler's
ultimate conclusion is that the Lockerbie trial had done a disservice to the
cause of international criminal justice. It was neither fair, nor conducted in
an objective manner.

Koechler's final
message to Kofi Annan is to express the hope that Megrahi's appeal will
"correct the deficiencies" of the trial and that will depend on the
integrity and independence of the five judges who will hear it.

The appeal against
conviction is likely to be heard in September.

* The man
behind the report

HANS Koechler has
been professor of legal, anthropological and political philosophy in the law
faculty at the University of Innsbruck, in Austria, since 1982.

As well as writing
on theology and morals, he has written papers on the ethics of sanctions, the
political principles of Pope John Paul II, and the problems of over-centralisation
in Europe.

His titles include
The New International Economic Order, The Legal Aspects of the Palestinian
Problem, and The UN and International Democracy.

He is founder and
president of the International Progress Organisation in Vienna, which promotes
cultural and academic exchanges between nations and advances an open-minded but
critical attitude towards ideological and political systems. It is a
non-governmental organisation in consultative status with the UN.

He was selected as
one of five independent observers for the Lockerbie trial by the United Nations
secretary-general Kofi Annan.

The others were
Robert Thabit, also representing IPO; M H Baerenboom of the European Commission;
Ms Hairat Balogun of the Organisation of Arab Unity; and Dr Nabil El-Araby of
the Arab League.